American Idol judges vow to revamp show

PASADENA, Calif. — It can be all too easy, when considering American Idol at times — parodied, ridiculed, complained about, picked apart, taken for granted and kicked around at times — to forget that, at its core, it’s a nationally televised talent competition in which young, sometimes very young, singers are vaulted from obscurity to household fame in a process that lasts all of 14 weeks.

Instead, the two remained civil and courteous toward each other. And when a visiting writer from Canada asked about the process of picking an Idol — and how a 15- or 16-year-old can possibly prepare for being thrust into the public spotlight in such an open and public way — the conversation soon turned meaningful.

Days earlier, that same writer asked Katharine McPhee, who finished runner-up in 2006 at age 21 and is now one of the lead players in the Broadway ensemble drama Smash, the same question, and McPhee admitted that, looking back on her Idol experience now, she found it to be both exhilarating and intimidating. In hindsight, McPhee said, she wasn’t prepared for either.

Who could be, at that age?

Even so, Jackson said Idol can be an invaluable proving ground for a young singer who listens to advice — even when it seems to be conflicting advice — and takes the process seriously.

“If you listen to us, for the people who really pay attention, we’re actually giving them a lot of amazing advice every week,” Jackson said. ‘Change this.’ ‘Do that.’ ‘That song was too big.’ ‘That’s the wrong kind of song.’ ‘The key was too high.’ ‘What are you doing? Look at what you’re wearing — you don’t look comfortable.’ If they listen to what we’re saying and take it in, it can make all the difference. We’re really trying to help them.

“You wait for them to bloom. You believe in them early, but you’re also waiting for them to come to fruition at some point. It’s about who can grow through this.”

Carey said Idol’s frenetic pace, where a young singer can jump to a whole new level in little more than a week, is one of the things that energizes her most about the Idol process.

“It’s tough when they don’t listen and come back and make the same mistake over and over, because you know they have the potential,” Carey said. “That’s where I get frustrated.”

Jackson said the contestants who don’t listen are often the first to go.

“Look, it’s hard to listen when you’re 16 and you have tons of people at home and millions of people watching — cheering, booing, whatever. It’s hard, but that’s what it’s like.”

Carey, for her part, said she takes Idol seriously, rumours of a behind-the-scene spat aside.

“There are some strong personalities here,” Carey said. “I knew, starting this process, that there could be a difference of opinions. This is a very passionate panel. The fighting is what it is, but this is American Idol: It’s bigger than that. It’s bigger than some stupid, trumped-up thing. It’s about the next huge talent, a (potential) superstar that will come from this show.”

Minaj concurred.

“Even up until the last day before I had to sign my contact, I was still not 100-per-cent sold because I felt American Idol is so big that you can’t do it unless you commit to it fully,” Minaj said.

“I’ve made a lot of difficult choices in my career but I knew I was never going to get another opportunity to be part of something this big, that reaches middle America. In the end, I felt that I really didn’t have anything to lose. It’s a show I’ve watched since the first season. It’s an incredible show. I know it’s going to create a star, and I wanted to have a part in that.”

“A lot of the time,” Urban added, “these young artists are surrounded by people or their family who tell them they’re thing most amazing thing. They’re not the most amazing thing. They’re OK. They’re not great. But they could be great, and hopefully we can help them a little bit to get where they’re trying to go.”

Minaj agreed, adding that nothing bothers her more about TV singing competitions than empty praise.

“When I watch these shows and someone says ‘yes’ to a person who clearly doesn’t deserve it, it bothers me,” MInaj said. “It bothers me in my soul, and I want to jump through the TV. I feel for the people who are genuinely talented there. It minimizes and takes away from how talented they really are.

“When I came on this show, I really didn’t have a problem saying ‘no,’ because I feel we’re looking for the best of the best.”

McPhee, for her part, said she’s a different person now — older, wiser — but that she was and still is grateful for her Idol experience.

It was intimidating at the time, though, she admitted, especially for someone so green.

“It really does feel like it happened to a different person,” McPhee said quietly. “Sort of an out-of-body experience. It was several years ago now, but I’m always aware of what’s going on with the show, who the next judge is, that sort of thing. I’m grateful it did what it was supposed to do, which is get you that platform to get you to the next level.

“But it’s not something where I wake up every morning and go, ‘I was on American Idol!’ It was an amazing experience. It did what it was supposed to, and I’m grateful for that.”

McPhee had ready advice for any young singer considering a run in a TV talent competition like Idol.

“I would never say, ‘Don’t take it too seriously,’ ” she said. “It’s very serious. It’s something that could really change your life.

“For me, though, it’s such a different show today than when I was on it. They get so many more things than we did, just in terms of earpieces, rehearsal time, things that we didn’t have when we were there. It’s just a very different show.

“I really did not know myself when I was on the show, as a musician. It’s one thing if you can sing — that’s great. Good for you. But you need to know who you are as a musician.

“That was the big challenge for me, coming off the show. I wanted to be an actress. I thought I’d go on American Idol and get some good exposure. I had no idea I would do as well as I did. I made it to the very end — isn’t that crazy? I still can’t believe I actually did that.

“But with that came huge record contracts and all that stuff. I didn’t realize I was going to suddenly have to have an identity as a musician. I wasn’t ready for that. So my advice to anyone starting out on the show is to try and figure out who you are as a musician first.”

American Idol returns with back-to-back, two-hour episodes Jan. 16 and 17, on CTV and Fox.

National TV columnist for Postmedia News Network.
Two solitudes:
“My dream is to have a bank of TVs where all the different channels are on at the same time and I can be monitoring them,” the social... read more critic Camille Paglia told Wired magazine, back in the day, before Big Brother and before Survivor. “I love the tabloid stuff. The trashier the program is, the more I feel it’s TV.”
And then there’s this, from Gilligan’s Island creator Sherwood Schwartz: “There’s a lot of underlying philosophy to the characters on Gilligan’s Island. They’re really a metaphor for the nations of the world, and their purpose was to show how nations have to get along together . . . or cease to exist.”
There you have it, then. The trashier a program is, the more it’s like TV. Or, if you prefer, TV is a metaphor for the nations of the world, and Gilligan’s Island was really a message about why we don’t all get along.
That’s where I come in.
My first TV memory was of being menaced by a Dalek on Doctor Who — the original, scratchy, black-and-white Who.
My more recent TV memories include the Sopranos finale; 9/11; Elvis Costello’s first appearance (and temporary banishment) on Saturday Night Live; what was really inside the Erlenmeyer flask in The X-Files; Law & Order (the original, and those iconic chimes); glued to the set at 3am local time during the 2003 war in Iraq — TV’s first real-time war —and Bart Simpson scrawling on the chalkboard in The Simpsons’ opening credits: “I Must Not Write All Over the Walls.”
Other Bart-isms, as seen on that TV chalkboard over the years: “I Will Never Win an Emmy,” “I No Longer Want My MTV,” and, pointedly — if a little hopefully — “Network TV is Not Dead.”
I was there to witness "the new dawn of the sitcom" in the mid-1990s, followed — inevitably — by the glut of terrible sitcoms in the early naughts, a glut that led, directly and indirectly, to the rise of reality TV.
There’s been a lot to talk about — good, bad and indifferent — about TV over the years.
That’s where you, and this space, come in. Read on. Enjoy, feel free to agree, disagree and dispute whenever you want. TV may be ugly at times, but it's a mirror of democracy in action. A funhouse mirror at times, a sober reflection at others.View author's profile